PS (Post Sherlock): I Still Love You
by Mysana
Summary: Sherlock was dead, and yet somehow he was still the centre of John's life.
1. Prologue

It started nice and slowly like all important changes. It starts with a case, like always. John is listening to Sherlock list off his deductive reasoning, and just a split second before Sherlock says it - John deduces that the wife couldn't have done it. He only sees it because Sherlock has mentioned this sort of thing before. (The crime took place in a very muddy forest, the wife was found dead from suicide just a couple feet away. They had thought it was a murder-suicide but the wife had clearly been moved as she was wearing heels that didn't have any mud on them except from where she was laying. Therefore, she had been killed somewhere else and moved.)

Another time they're in a room looking at body, nothing new there. And John recognises the tie. It's one Sherlock had been experimenting on a couple of weeks. What demographics wore it; how long it took to strangle someone with (no humans were harmed); what fibres it left behind. At the time, John couldn't remember the answers to the questions. However, when Sherlock listed a few of them, well, they all came back and John made sure to remember them carefully.

It started to become more clear, to John at least, just a couple of weeks before the whole Moriarty/suicide thing. They walked into a crime scene, and as John looked around…. He missed things, but he could see what Sherlock was going to say, to deduce before it happened. The thing is…. John didn't notice. His Sherlock was there, why should he care that he could tell you what was going to happen next.

John Watson knew Sherlock so well he could mimic the genius. And in that way, John had become a genius of his own.


	2. Chapter 1

At 3 am in London the streets are foggy and empty. John walks down an alley, bare but for the ghost of Sherlock who skirts the corners and mumbles deductions just loud enough for John to hear. All things Sherlock has said before, but in a different time. (When he was _alive_.) Sherlock's ghost talks about the footprints in the dirt skirting the walls.

John never comments, never reacts. He just enjoys listening to Sherlock's ghost deduce random facts. Things he would never have learned without Sherlock. He knows, _he knows_ , that Sherlock is dead. He also knows that it's not normal to see your dead friend. In the end, it always comes down to two key facts.

Sherlock has never been normal.

John doesn't care. He's not ready to let Sherlock go. (He'll never be ready.)

In every moment John revels in Sherlock's voice, revealing deeper truths in the world. Both wander London, shades of the city.

It's close on morning when John sees the door to Baker Street. The city has woken up and the infamous traffic can be once again be seen clogging its veins. Sherlock's ghost rushes up to 221B's door deducing things as they come into John's sight.

"The knocker is straight. Mycroft's been here." Sherlock sounds irritated as he inspects the door, "he's still here. Otherwise he would have relocked the door properly. He's so paranoid."

John looks at the door for a moment, waiting for the deductions to stop and the hallucination of Sherlock to step to the side so John can unlock the door.

"Nice of you to visit Mycroft," John says wearily from the bottom of the stairs.

"Hello John," Mycroft's voice carries as John slowly makes his way up. His voice is tight. Stress? Exhaustion? Annoyance? The weight on John's shoulders feels twice as heavy as it did while he was walking. He's counting the minutes until can return to it. (Based on the average length of Mycroft's visits, 7 minutes.) He's waiting until Sherlock (who is looking tense and standing three steps up) can start deducing people who don't matter. People who aren't Mycroft.

"Tea, Mycroft?" John says, his voice light and not at all pointed in response to the pot of steaming tea on the newly cleared side table. The dust which has settled everywhere in the room is gone. The experiment Sherlock had left on the kitchen counter has been cleaned up.

"Your gun's gone," Sherlock notes, his voice oddly empty. John glances over to where Sherlock is looking up the stairs. "Mycroft thinks you're at risk of shooting yourself." John turns back to Mycroft. "You agree." Sherlock sounds so betrayed. (You don't get to do that. You _jumped off a building_. _You left me_.)

"What do you want, Mycroft."

"London is no longer agreeing with you, John." Mycroft gives John's leg a significant look. (It's been acting up. Sherlock said he had around a month until he needed a cane again.)

"Yeah." (He's everywhere. His voice won't leave me alone. _Why did he leave me alone?_ )

"When was the last time you slept through the night?"

(The night before Sherlock jumped.) John shrugs and sits carefully on the chair. If he doesn't pay attention he may well collapse. John carefully clasps the teapot and pours himself a mug with shaking hands.

"Mycroft, get to the point." (I can't deal with you. You look so much like him. He pretended otherwise but he loved you.)

"I want to move you. There is a small town with a vacancy. A summer home. Just until you get back on your feet."

"Mycroft," John says, trying to keep his voice from the exhaustion he feels. Sherlock is standing behind Mycroft commenting on how he must not care about Sherlock's death very much. He's only put on a little weight. (1/2 a stone.) And considering the whole mess with Europe right now…

"Please John." Mycroft's voice is pleading and John doesn't need Sherlock to decipher the words behind it. (I promised him. I promised _Sherlock._ )

"When?" John admits defeat. He can't. (How can he argue with that. Sherlock is making them both do things they don't want, even from the grave.)

"As soon as possible. The movers will be here in a few minutes. The flat will kept available to you, of course."

"Fine." He doesn't care. He used to love 221B, but it won't bring Sherlock back, so he doesn't care.

"In the meantime, gather an overnight bag, there is a car waiting for you downstairs when you're ready." Mycroft stands and makes his way towards the door. "I'll see you soon John." It sounds like a promise. Sherlock is huffing because he hadn't seen a car downstairs, John pretends that it's not because he hadn't seen. He pretends that Sherlock, all on his own, missed the car. It's foolish. It's unrealistic. He does it anyway.

John doesn't bother to sigh. Instead he stands and grabs the bag sitting discreetly by the door. The bag has been there for… a while. (Three days after Sherlock.) John had felt nervous, on edge, like he was about to go on the run. The bag has been sitting there since. It holds a pair of pyjamas and enough layers of clothing to keep him warm in the London weather. It also has £4,000, a toothbrush, a razor, deodorant, a hair brush, and a fake ID Sherlock had insisted he own.

John hasn't worried about money since Sherlock left (and wasn't it so much easier to say left than dead, it was lie, but it was easier). John was a practical man, for the most part, but he didn't care if he lost 221B, or didn't have enough money to buy dinner- it's not like he would eat it anyway. Irony, however, loved to take the mick, and Mycroft had made sure John was living, if not in comfort. (He _couldn't_ live in comfort - not without Sherlock.)

John took the bag and walked down stairs and Sherlock stood by the door until John arrived. For the most part Sherlock seemed highly dedicated to the realism of John's hallucination. However, this Sherlock still always stayed in John's line of sight and never commented on things John couldn't see or notice himself. That was probably the only reason John knew it wasn't real.

The real Sherlock had never waited for John.


End file.
